A year ago, Take 3 partnered with WSL PURE, the nonprofit arm of World Surf League, who’s mission is to inspire, educate and empower the global surfing community to protect our oceans. The partnership aims to raise awareness of global plastic pollution and inspire the surfing community to join our movement and connect to the planet.

Take 3 CEO and Co-founder Tim Silverwood caught up with the WSL broadcast team during the Quiksilver & Boost Mobile Pro to discuss all about the progress we’ve made over the past year and what our future holds.

HOW WAS YOUR TIME UP AT SNAPPER FOR THE QUIK PRO + BOOST MOBILE PRO EVENTS IN 2019?
We were so stoked to be at Snapper Rocks for the second year of our partnership with WSL PURE. Since the partnership launched in 2018, we’ve seen a massive increase in support from the global surfing community. Our #Take3fortheSea hashtag has now been used almost 100k times in 129 countries with a projected 10 million items of trash being removed by our global community each year.

WHAT WAS TAKE 3 DOING ON THE GROUND AT THE EVENTS?
We took the opportunity to engage visitors to the contest site in our simple Take 3 message and to start a conversation on solutions to protect our oceans from plastic. We had 20 volunteers including school age students, surfers and environmentalists who interacted with the crowd, cleaned up the site and entered people in our ‘Guess the Cigarettes’ competition.

Cigarette butts are the most littered item globally with an estimated 4.5 trillion entering the environment every year. Many people don’t realize that cigarette butts are actually made of plastic. The butts are made from a material called cellulose acetate that breaks into small micro fibers that are harmful to marine life.

To enter the competition you had to guess how many cigarettes were in a large container full of butts collected during a 1-hour clean up. We were stoked to have prizes from Quiksilver, AwayCo and Formatt board racks to give away.

WHEN YOU AREN’T HANGING OUT AT SURF COMPETITIONS WHAT ARE YOU DOING?
We recently moved into our new Take 3 Office & Sustainability Hub that was renovated by our newest ambassadors Kyal and Kara – watch the film here! We’re stoked to finally have a space for our core team, volunteers, students and friends of Take 3 to get connected and help our organization grow to the next level of reach and impact.

Day to day, we are delivering education programs in schools, surf clubs and communities to reduce plastic pollution, advocate for a circular economy and most importantly, connect people to the planet. We’re concerned that people are becoming increasingly disconnected from the natural world and the planet is clearly suffering. It’s human instinct to protect what you love so we need more and more people to love the planet and our oceans.

When you donate to Take 3 you are supporting our education programs in schools, surf clubs, communities and online. So far we’ve educated over 300,00 people through Take 3 programs, visited over 350 schools and working with 40 surf clubs nationally. Our once local initiative is now a global movement inspiring people to join in and become part of the solution to plastic pollution.

Take 3 community members showing why they #Take3

WHAT ARE YOUR ASPIRATIONS FOR 2019?
We have huge aspirations for 2019. We’re continuing our education programs on the ground in Australia with a focus on inspiring future leaders. We’re calling on our international online community to Take 3 for the Sea as part of the #Take3Challenge that aims to remove 1 million pieces of rubbish from the environment in 2 months.

We’ll be encouraging our global community to join in the Plastic Free July campaign, now in its 8th year and we’ll be celebrating our 10th birthday in October. It’s going to be a huge year!

Remember, every single time you #Take3fortheSea you are joining a global movement of people who are preventing plastic from harming our planet. For more information visit www.take3.org

Take 3 volunteers and community members during our beach clean up at the Quiksilver Pro 2019